The Washington State Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) Health Careers Ecosystem, referred to as The Ecosystem, is a backbone organization that mobilizes, coordinates, and facilitates the process of collective impact. We are a volunteer driven group of BIPOC leaders and professionals throughout the state, dedicated to increasing the number of URM health professionals in Washington State. The Ecosystem represents a multi-sector network of BIPOC led health career programs and partnerships, and it continues to grow. The goal is to develop this network into a service entity that provides organizational support to BIPOC-led healthcare programming across Washington State.

From 2019-2021, The Ecosystem convened a series of well-attended stakeholder meetings.  Through a collaborative process, common organizational, logistical, and administrative needs were identified amongst the ecosystem programs present. These gatherings of BIPOC led community programs and organizations made apparent that programming limitations often came down to a lack of integration and structuring of programs so that they provide case-by-case support for participants, lack of staff, or the staff on hand lacking the specialized skill set, or technical resources to best address the identified needs.  It also was increasingly apparent that with the exception of time and staff, the knowledge, skills, and resources to address these needs in BIPOC programming across the state, existed within the body of multi-sectoral programming represented by BIPOC healthcare leaders right there within the room. This is how The Ecosystem was born.